The Softer Side Of Warren Meers
by Whiskey Meteor
Summary: A Sunnydale edition of the Twilight Zone. Warren creates a robot-witch that he believes will help in his, Jonathan, and Andrew’s attempt to take over Sunnydale. But this is the Twilight Zone, so irony abounds and things don’t turn out at all how the


Title: The Softer Side Of Warren Mears  
  
Author: Whiskey Meteor tartapplewedgeshotmail.com  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Summary: A Sunnydale edition of the Twilight Zone. Warren creates a robot-witch that he believes will help in his, Jonathan, and Andrew's attempt to take over Sunnydale. But this is the Twilight Zone, so irony abounds and things don't turn out at all how they were planned. Warren/Andrew undertones.  
  
Notes/Disclaimer: Takes place in season six and goes AU after the three guys agree to team up and take over the town. My very sincere apologies for the campiness, and for any mistakes in anything written in a language other than English. Neither the Twilight Zone nor BtVS are mine. Thanks to Karen for the beta!  
  
Picture in your mind a town. A small, a-typical, American town. A town with more graveyards per capita than any other town. It is here that tonight's story takes place: in Sunnydale, a small, a-typical, American town... located deep in the depths of the Twilight Zone.  
  
Join me now in Sunnydale where, nestled snugly in a small, cheap apartment in the center of town, there lives a very special young man. He is a typical, tall, dark and mysterious young man, very unusually preoccupied with electronics of every kind. He is a young and aspiring evil genius. And his name is Warren Meers.  
  
Today we find Warren involved in a game of Dungeons and Dragons with two other young men he would call his best friends. Meet Jonathan and Andrew, mild mannered, if not mildly evil and geeky to within an inch of their lives, young men. Jonathan is dark haired, Andrew light, though both have taken a milky pallor thanks to too much artificial light and not enough sun.  
  
On this day, Warren has hatched an evil plan, and when we join these three characters, he is just about to pull his friends into the plot.  
  
"So," he says, in a tense voice pinched by a grasping to sound calmly conversational. "You guys wanna team up and take over Sunnydale?"  
  
Jonathan and Andrew turn to each other and exchange a fleeting look before they both commit with a shrug. "Sure," they agree. And after all, why not? There's so little else to do in Sunnydale. Warren rewards them with a "cool" and a bob of his head, and they slip back into their game as they would have from any other normal mid-game conversation. Although this conversation was anything but normal, and would trigger an event that would alter their lives irrevocably.  
  
In the days that followed Warren's announcement of his evil plot, he set to work on his greatest project to date: one that would help them win control over their town, and one that would be a true testament to the depths of Warren's electronic abilities. And no more than one week to the day after that fateful conversation, the project was finally finished. It was a super-realistic robot programmed and proficient in casting summoning, pyrotechnic, transfiguring, and banishing spells of every size and shape. In addition, it was designed to be a woman of dark and devastating beauty, and in this regard she was a supreme success.   
  
At present we find Warren admiring his handiwork, standing pack with a proud smile smeared across his face as she spins around to show herself off. A perfect woman, dark-haired and dark-eyed, she was the second model of his second design strategy, and Warren had named her M2D2.  
  
"M2," Warren beams smugly, "you're the very best of all my creations." M2D2 smiles politely, her lips curling up just the way that Warren had specified they should. He laughs out loud at the sheer magnificence of his work, and then shakes his head in awe as he corrects himself. "You're the best of any creation."  
  
"I am," she agrees pleasantly. "And I am so because you have made me so."  
  
"You'd better believe it, baby," Warren gives a little nod, an odd gesture that is both nervous and also unervingly intense in one short movement. "Show me what you've got."  
  
Without the slightest hesitation, the robot reaches and begins to lift her shirt, coyly revealing herself inch by inch to her creator. But, after a moment lost in the exposure of creamy, perfect skin he has created, Warren waves his hands and bids her to stop. "You don't want to see what I've got?" she says, her voice remaining flat and pleasant.  
  
"No. Well, yes. But later." Warren pushes her shirt back down and pats her reassuringly on the arm. "Show me your skills--uh, magic skills." He nods his strange nod again and chews thoughtfully on his lower lip as he regards her. "Show me your best spells."  
  
M2D2 smiles and takes a step back. "For you, Warren, I will show you the best of each of the groups of spells that you designed me to cast."  
  
"Great." Warren motions for her to go on. "Dazzle me."  
  
"Summoning." M2D2 spreads her arms and closes her eyes. As we watch, her smile fades and is replaced by a look of ultimate concentration. Slowly, her lips part and in a dark and foreboding voice she proclaims, "Dal cielo scuro, Convoco un guerriero. Venuto, guerriero, e dado soltanto da fuoco!"   
  
A mighty crack of air splitting whips through Warren's room, and all at once our two characters are joined by a third.  
  
M2D2 has summoned an ice-demon from the hell dimension Tortura Delghiaccio, and a hulking mass of chilled terror, it towers in the corner of Warren's room. "What did you do?" Warren asks abruptly, his eyes whipping back and forth between the ice-demon and his powerful creation. "Why... what... please make that... that... thing go away," he begs, his voice trailing off into a desperate shout.  
  
The demon cuts Warren off with a shrill cry of its own. "Perchè lo avete convocato?" it demands, glowering at the robot.  
  
"What does it want?" Warren shrieks. "Kill it! Kill it!"  
  
M2D2 nods primly. "Pyrotechnics," she states blandly, and we watch as again she stretches out her arms and closes her eyes. "Terra, vento, e la pioggia riduce. Denomino sarò fuoco! Bruci il mio nemico!"  
  
Again, the air in the room splits. There is a crackling of energy, and sulfur scent drifts in on a sudden, forceful wind. To our and Warren's amazement, a bright ball of flames forms above the robot's head. We watch as Warren's expression melts from fear back into smug self-satisfaction. He looks over at the ice-demon and offers it a wicked smile as the ball of flames shoots through the air directly towards it. There is a shrill death scream and a bright explosion of heat and cold, and when the smoke clears from the room, we find Warren and his creation alone once again.  
  
After a moment of pleased silence, Warren turns back to his robot. "That was cool." He nods his approval. "Very cool."  
  
"I am glad that you approve, Warren," M2D2 says matter-of-factly. "My abilities are, as you stated, 'cool' because you designed me. Shall I continue my demonstration?"  
  
Warren smiles eagerly. "Yeah. Sure."  
  
"Transfiguration." The robot gives a pleasant smile, and points a perfect, slender finger towards her creator.  
  
Warren hesitates. "Uh, shouldn't you not be pointing at me?" An unsettling glow begins to radiate from the robot's outstretched hand, and more unsettling still, it begins to creep through the air in a slow, steady spiral. "Hey," Warren exclaims, backing away uneasily, "what are you doing?" But even as he speaks, Warren is engulfed by the magical glow. "What are you doing?!"  
  
"I am doing as you instructed, Warren."  
  
"You're transfiguring me?! You can't transfigure me!"  
  
"I can, Warren," she says with dark eyes flashing. "I can because you made me." We watch as Warren is struck dumb with the utter understanding that he has manufactured his own premature defeat. Not more than a moment later, M2D2 calls out in a thick, rough accent, "Ich bot Sie, Form zu ändern! Verschieben Sie sich von Mann zu Ofenhandschuh!" There is a thick puff of sulfur scented smoke, and when it clears, Warren is gone.  
  
And yet, he is still with us. For in the very square foot in which Warren was standing, there now sits a very curious item. Not curious for what it is, but entirely curious for where it now finds itself. What sits on the floor where Warren had been is a small, plain, and white oven-mitt. But then, there is one thing that makes this oven-mitt peculiar, one thing that sets it apart from the billions of other, normal oven-mitts all over the world. If you guessed that this oven-mitt is, in fact, not an oven-mitt, but in actuality merely Warren in the soft, quilted form of an oven-mitt, then you are correct.   
  
Finding himself so very suddenly in this new form, Warren panicked; though to his dismay he found that he could neither speak, nor move. His creation was truly a masterpiece, and the spell had been equally as great: Warren strains and prays and begs his muscles to function, but he is an oven-mitt, and so as immobile and useless as his new state of being dictates.  
  
"This isn't fair!" he screams. "Turn me back, you bitch!" But Warren's words echo in his mind only.  
  
"Banishing." This the robot states, continuing the demonstration with her dark eyes turned down to focus on her creator's new form. Now, slowly, she closes those eyes and stretches out her arms, her palms facing up towards the ceiling. Warren is screaming, but only he can hear his cry. "Ad un posto contenuto, a metà strada in mezzo qui ed i fuochi eternal, Mi trasmetto." Warren recognizes Italian, but he can only grasp at the meaning of what his creation is speaking. He is certain, however, that his situation is not about to get any better. "E là la I sarà limitata fino alle conclusioni di tempo!" M2D2 finishes and opens her eyes. There is a burst of electric power that courses through the air, and the room is shaken by a thunderous crack.  
  
And then to his surprise, Warren the oven-mitt is left all alone in his room with a certain feeling of emptiness, and the large, charred circle where mere minutes ago his ultimate creation had destroyed the hulking ice-demon.  
  
Warren struggles to move and screams at the top of his no longer existent lungs; but despite his efforts, silence, and along with it an eerie calm, settles over the room.  
  
We re-enter our story some time later--days maybe, or even weeks. But it is not the span of time that has passed which is of importance, but more over what has come to pass in that time. You may remember Andrew and Jonathan, and at present they are much as you would remember them. However, they had neither seen nor heard from Warren since he propositioned them over their game of Dungeons and Dragons, and, confused by Warren's sudden and prolonged disappearance, they have given up their desire to take over their town.  
  
Now we will follow this pale pair as together they arrive at Warren's home, meaning to tell him of their change of heart.   
  
Jonathan knocks briskly on the door and then they wait. "Do you think he'll be mad?" Andrew asks, wringing his hands nervously.  
  
Jonathan snorts. "Why would he be mad?" Andrew aims a dubious and disarming look at his dark-haired friend, but after a moment, Jonathan scoffs and shakes his head. "He'll get over it." This seems enough consolation for Andrew, and the two continue to wait in silence. But the wait runs long, and suspicion begins to rise. The two young men exchange glances and then trudge reluctantly around to the back of Warren's home, where they can enter through a window left open for this reason, in case of trouble. "He's probably just out," Jonathan maintains. "Maybe he went grocery shopping or something."   
  
But Andrew is unconvinced. "He was working on something big." Now at the open emergency entrance window, the two exchange another look. Andrew volunteers Jonathan to go first, and Jonathan agrees after a minimal amount of whining from his friend.  
  
Inside the house is dark and quiet. It feels empty, and somehow cold, and immediately the two young men agree that they were right to break in. They split up in order to speed their search. Jonathan takes the ground floor, with the kitchen and the living room, and although he searches thoroughly, he finds nothing out of the ordinary. There are half-finished, grim looking devices and piles of mechanical debris strewn over every spare inch of counter space, but for Warren's house, this is ordinary.   
  
Andrew takes the upstairs, with the bathroom and Warren's room, and conducts a search every bit as thorough as Jonathan's. He finds nothing out of order, save for a two sights that catch his eye: a rogue oven mitt, laying as an oven mitt would on the floor of Warren's room. And across the room from the oven mitt, a mysterious charred circle. The air in the room has the stale scent of lingering sulfur and electricity.  
  
Andrew's hopes fall as he stoops to inspect the burned mark on the floor.  
  
"Nothing downstairs," calls Jonathan's voice, clear, but low and wary from the doorway. "Did you find anything?"  
  
"Just... this." Andrew points to the charred circle sadly.   
  
"What is it?"  
  
Andrew shrugs.   
  
"You said he was working on something big, right?" Jonathan waits for Andrew's nod before going on. "Maybe... Well, maybe it was too big."  
  
"You think--?" Andrew's eyes dart back and forth between Jonathan and the dark burn on the floor. "Oh god. Poor Warren. Should we tell his parents... or something?"  
  
"Yeah right," Jonathan snorts again. "Hey Mrs. Meers, your son liked to build things, and we think that the last thing he built blew him up. Sorry." He shakes his head. "Maybe it would be best just to keep it quiet. And I think we should leave. Who knows what else he's been building up here." Jonathan shivers, though the house is not cold.  
  
"Go ahead," Andrew offers, "I'll be right behind you." Jonathan nods and we can hear his footsteps proceed heavily down the stairs and away until the house is once more bathed in its unsettling quiet. After a long moment, Andrew rises from the floor, and a tear wells in the corner of the poor boy's eye. Then, pulled as if by some unseen force, Andrew's eyes are drawn across the floor and back to the oven-mitt.  
  
He crosses to the little mitt, kneels, reaches, and takes it in his hands. "So you must be the last thing Warren touched before..." With a sniffle and a long sigh of mourning, Andrew takes the mitt and presses it against his chest, just about directly above where his heart is. Andrew remembers a time when Warren's head had rested on his chest where the oven-mitt now lay, and though he knows he shouldn't take the little mitt with him, all of a sudden he can't bear to be parted from it. Something in the softness and the give of the quilted fabric is familiar against Andrew's body, and as he holds it to his chest he is overwhelmed by the feeling that a part of Warren has somehow survived with this mitt. "I'll never forget you, Warren," Andrew tells it.  
  
Then he rises from the floor and takes one, final look around the room before quietly leaving with the oven-mitt tucked lightly under his arm.  
  
Imagine if you will a small room, furnished with a small bed, a small desk, and a large computer. It is an average room belonging to an average young man, and yet, a very unusual thing resides in it. This is Andrew's room, and upon his small bed, propped up against a soft, down pillow, is an item that I'm sure you will recall: a small, white-colored oven-mitt. It is Warren.  
  
Andrew often spends his days with Jonathan now, having lost interest over time in the token his former friend left behind. And so Warren lives a trapped and lonely life, mute and immobile. There is a mirror on the wall at the foot of the bed, and Andrew has left Warren in such a position that he can see his own reflection in it. And it is here, unable to move or speak, and staring straight ahead, that Warren spends the bulk of his time. He sits and stares at his transfigured form and marvels at the power of the thing he created that could perform such magical feats. He sits and stares and marvels at the wonder of his creation's power. And he curses himself for having ever created it, now and for the rest of his days, here... in the Twilight Zone.  
  
Fade to black.  
  
Roll credits. 


End file.
